PARENTS GET TRAINING ON THERAPEUTIC EXERCISES FOR SPECIAL NEEDS CHILDREN THROUGH UMCARES SEMINAR AND WORKSHOPS

The Community & Sustainability Centre (UMCares), University of Malaya (UM) with WELL Rehabilitation Centre jointly organised Seminar and Workshop on Therapeutic Exercises to Improve Sensory Skills for Children with Special Educational Needs throughout the months of September and October 2017. Five schools namely SK Sri Damai, SK Satu Sultan Alam Shah, SK Section 11 Kota Damansara, SK Sri Kelana, and SK Damansara Jaya 1, as well as 80 parents and their children with special educational needs participated in the seminar and workshop series. The programme focused on delivering seminar and workshops on effective therapeutic exercises focusing on gross and fine motor skills to parents while being monitored by expert trainers.

The programme was launched by the Director of Community and Sustainability Centre (UMCares), Professor Dr. Norzulaani Khalid with En. Mohd Haris Rahmat, Special Education Officer from the Petaling Utama District Education Office. Professor Dr. Norzulaani in her opening remark said that “UM is committed to community engagement, it taps the expertise and voluntary interests of academician within UM”.

Leading the project, Dr Donnie Adams, who is also a senior lecturer at the Institute of Educational Leadership, UM, said that the project aims to provide exposure to parents with special needs children on various categories of special needs, and how they can play a role to assist the development of their children in terms of their emotion, behaviour, psychomotor skills and reducing the disability appearance. He further added, “Children with special educational needs have less or almost no therapeutic exercise at home because parents have less exposure or have minimal knowledge on how to assist their children in this area”.